Direct Download The primary purpose of AnimGet (or Animation Get) is to extract animation frames for use in RPG Maker (or other animation programs). When activated, it will work in the background, taking snapshots every 10 milliseconds, which can then […]

Direct DownloadIt appears the downloadlink is offline. Update soon. ResHack (short for Resource Hack) is a great utility that allows modification of games or RM2K/3 settings. Game icons, logos, text, individual settings, etc. can be modified to suit individual needs. […]

Dan’s ToolReview & Download Dan’s RMXP Tool is a useful utility for inspiration, which allows you to create names for characters, game titles, and a plethora of other things. The title is something of a misnomer because it can be […]

RMXP UnlimitedThe website and file are no longer available! What’s a character set without a matching face? Well, with Face Maker, currently at version 3.1, you can design facesets for message boxes. It doesn’t seem to have been updated in […]

This will now be the official blog for RPG Maker Times and will no longer be a "companion" site. The original RPG Maker Times blog will remain, but it will be used mostly for any updates that appear here.

VidarA despairing RPG-Puzzler set in a town on the brink. Random storytelling. Random puzzles. Constant loss.

Congratulations are certainly in order because the game Vidar has been funded at Kickstarter!

What I’m most excited about is its complete randomness. You’re a stranger who arrives in the town of Vidar, where a monster kills someone every night. Whoever dies changes the storyline, so its replayability is very high.

I wasn’t able to back it this time – as much as I wanted to – this is one of the projects I’ve been closely following silently since its inception. It certainly looks like it would be an awesome game, especially with its randomness. So this will appear somewhere on the top of my games to buy list.

Trolls are everywhere!

If you’re thinking about the supernatural beings in Norse mythology or Scandinavian folklore, Tolkien’s trolls that turned to stone after sunlight, the prodigiously strong and incredibly stupid trolls from Harry Potter, or even the cutesy trolls (think Pabbie the troll king) in the Disney movie Frozen, then these are not the kinds of trolls I’m referring to.

I’m on about Internet Trolls, who sow the seeds of their discord on the Internet by posting inflammatory messages, inciting arguments designed to upset people and provoke emotional responses, and otherwise greatly disparaging others’ efforts and hard work.

Internet Trolls are not a new breed of troll. They’ve been around since the BBS and UseNet days of the 80s; they’re an evolving race, adapting to new technologies and adopting new methods for their dissension.

The Lurker Troll

There’s another kind of troll that’s often a game developer’s nightmare: the Lurker Troll. He lurks in the background, waiting, then does a hit-and-run with a low rating and no comment. (I often refer to these types as "trogs".)

I recently put my game on Gamejolt and out of the blue received a 1-star rating.

Now, I wonder how a plot and feature synopsis, two screenshots and a demo video alone can justify such a rating! After all, it’s how the game plays that is its greatest asset or downfall. Previously, there were six 5-star ratings based on what was presented so far, with the prospect of additional or adjusted ratings when a demo is made available. Of course with having such a glowing rating, a 1-star will knock it down significantly.

I don’t know the reasons for it. I’m open to constructive criticism and, indeed, encourage it. What I detest is low ratings with NO words at all. That doesn’t help me improve my game or make a gamer’s experience worthwhile. It contributes nothing to the game itself and only detracts from what’s been presented so far.

It’s also a reflection of the bestower’s mentality.

Enter The Troll

In my experience, such an action can only be attributed to a troll (or a trog). There could be any number of reasons behind the low rating, but in the end they’re still responsible for their actions and have to live with it.

A troll could low rate because:

They’re a jealous game developer that somehow feels threatened by your efforts.

They’re ignorant of how much hard work actually goes into developing a game (unable to do it themselves) and, frankly, they don’t care. They’re trolls and like biting hard to elicit an owch or two!

The game’s made with RPG Maker and we all know how bad that is, right? Yeah, right!

They hate all the positive feedback the game is receiving so far and want to knock it down.

They’re just a mean, dispirited person with no morals about how it could affect other people. It gives them a sense of satisfaction just because they can give a 1 star rating.

To me, it doesn’t matter. Development on the game will continue, with or without their approval. Feedback from genuinely interested players will be much more of an asset to the game’s development than a low rating with no constructive criticism whatsoever.

Karma Calls

I’m a strong believer in "what comes around goes around". Actions with legitimate, sincere reasons behind them are always rewarded. Actions with disingenuous, spiteful reasons behind them are always punished.

It might take a while, but eventually the rewards or punishments do come.

Hence, if a person really doesn’t like the game and legitimately decides to low-rate, they’re entitled to that opinion without loss. Accompanying it, I’d appreciate and encourage feedback, perhaps to improve upon it or apply it to the next game I might create.

A low-rating for the sake of it is unacceptable and eventually it will come full circle. It always does!

I’ll be rewarded with my own satisfaction at having created and finished something for others to enjoy. It’ll also give me a sense of achievement at having utilized everything I’ve learned from previous attempts – since RM2K in fact – and putting it all together to craft a solid, playable, completed game.

Over the next three to six months, the entire RPG Maker Times domain (and all its subdomains) will be migrated to a more suitable, stable dedicated web host for its growing needs. The sites are clearly becoming too large (in both size and growth), as well as overall traffic increase, for its current web host to handle.

During this process, usual posts and updates shouldn’t be affected. It’ll most likely take three or more months to find a suitable web host either capable of handling the the demands of the domain and its subdomains or one better suited to its growing needs.

I’m very reluctant to leave my current web host. Their tech support is second to none! But their shared server simply isn’t equipped to deal with what RPG Maker Times is evolving into. Sometimes, with evolution comes change, and with that change there may be many sacrifices along the way.

This will be a mammoth undertaking, but one that is now deemed necessary.

If, like me, you hate the way large numbers are displayed without any separators, thus making it hard to read, then you’ll want the Gold Comma Separators Scriptlet for your games.

What this does is separates large numbers with a comma every three blocks of numbers. Thus, 100000 becomes 100,000. That’s way easier to read! (Incidentally, it took me ages to figure out how to successfully do this!)

The RPG Maker Times blog has come a long way since its earliest beginnings as a site devoted exclusively to RM2K/3 stuff on Blogger. And since migrating to its own domain name, it’s come farther still.

As a result, I love checking the site’s statistics: how many daily or monthly visitors, where visitors come from and ultimately which pages they’re drawn to. I also like checking the keywords that people are using to find the posts, whether those keywords are organic or direct or are from social media sites. Most days RPG Maker Times averages 250+ hits per day. That’s not bad considering it’s not been up that long really, as traffic is still stronger at Blogger (obviously because it’s Google’s).

So I’d like to start expanding further. As much as I try to blog frequently, including sharing scripts and reviews, I don’t have as much time as I’d like to mostly because of my odd hours. That’s why I’m looking for guest bloggers to post regularly on RPG Maker Times. Guest bloggers can share anything from tutorials to games reviews, or even voice opinions.

There won’t be any money, but if you have a website guest blogging will guarantee some exposure for you, including a short bio so you can promote yourself and any projects/games you might be working on! You can even post your own RPG Maker or game/project promo video on YouTube.

If interested, leave a comment and I’ll give you a "Contributor" status to post your articles. When you’re approved, they’ll then be placed as a post or page (depending on the nature of the post).

Note: Please don’t post the article in the comments, just sign up if you’re interested and I’ll give you a trial run. This applies to RPG Maker Times Blogsite. You have nothing to lose but a lot more to gain!

How to Create Autotiles #1 – Color-Coded Anatomy

Exporting RPG Maker games to iPhone, Android and other platforms is perhaps one of the most requested features for developers and users alike. This is especially true with the rise in popularity of "mobile" devices, such as phones and tablets. As a result technology demands further needs for exporting RPG Maker games to these formats.

A direct port of any RPG Maker to other platforms has too many technical problems to make it viable, especially since it uses Windows-reliant technology to run. There are further proprietary issues when it comes to using these on other platforms, such as DirectX, and copyright issues when using the default RTP when exporting RPG Maker games to iPhones, Android, and the many other platforms available.

The overall conclusion is that RPG Maker is and will remain a Windows only product. At least for now or until the technologies behind the various platforms can find a consolidated method for successfully exporting RPG Maker games.

The Seventh Son Movie Trailer

Plot Details

In a time of enchantments when legends and magic collide, the sole remaining warrior of a mystical order (Jeff Bridges) travels to find a prophesized hero born with incredible powers, the last Seventh Son (Ben Barnes). Torn from his quiet life as a farmhand, the unlikely young hero embarks on a daring adventure with his battle-hardened mentor to vanquish a dark queen (Julianne Moore) and the army of supernatural assassins she has dispatched against their kingdom.

Cast

The film is directed by Sergei Bodrov and has quite a cast: Aside from Jeff Bridges (whom everyone knows!), it also stars Julianne Moore (Carrie and The Hunger Games: Mockingjay), Kit Harington (Game of Thrones), Alicia Vikander (Ex Machina), Antje Traue (Man of Steel), Djimon Hounsou (Amistad and Gladiator), Olivia Williams (The Sixth Sense and X-Men: The Last Stand), Jason Scott Lee (Dragon: The Bruce Lee Story), and Ben Barnes (The Chronicles of Narnia movies and Dorian Gray).

Personal Thoughts

I’m looking forward to watching this! I haven’t been this excited about a fantasy movie since Dungeons & Dragons.

This is primarily to remove the dependency on the UCSM. Instead, the Q-Engine will contain the global settings required for the main scripts and the relevant configuration settings will be placed in the add-ons themselves. This will make it much easier to tweak rather than relying on a single configuration to set them.

I’ll also be creating a downloadable demo (finally), which will enable you to install the Q-Engine and all of its available add-ons without having to copy and paste them individually.

I’m making this a priority over the next few weeks to get this done as quickly as possible so I can focus on my other projects, especially Paranormality: Otherworld.

All of the downloads (from scripts to demos) are being reconfigured to make it easier and more convenient to access, depending on preferences. Scripts can be downloaded directly from RPG Maker Times or via my Pastebin.

Yes, I’m finally using my Pastebin; I’ve had the account for over two years but have never used it. So all downloads will have both options. If you use my scripts, don’t forget to observe the copyright notice in each and credit me accordingly please.

Many visitors might have noticed that the downloads (whether script or utility) haven’t been available. This was mainly due to several updates that had unexpected consequences. This has now mostly been resolved.

RPG Maker Times: Progress is slow but steady. This is primarily because of work; from Friday I have a few days off to spend exclusively on Otherworld. Here are the updates so far: The post Otherworld Updates So Far appeared first on Paranormality - Paranormal RPG Maker Projects.

RPG Maker Times: The Status Screen contains an overview of Anna’s essential personal information, such as attributes (parameters) and current states or conditions she’s afflicted with. Energy and Psi Energy (ENR) and Psi (PSI) are measurements of Anna’s overall "physical" and "mental" life forces. They will fluctuate quite a lot during the game and, since […]